AI for Education

An unexpected joy of starting AI for Education last year has been the opportunity to build a remarkable team of educators as deeply committed to building AI literacy across the education ecosystem as I am. Which is why we are excited to welcome Dr. Carmen Macharaschwili as our Senior Director of Learning & Development! With her expertise in digital learning, professional development and both K12 and Higher Education, Carmen will lead initiatives that help educators adopt generative AI responsibly by expanding our PD offerings and facilitator operations. Join me in welcoming Carmen to our small, mighty team! #edtech #startup #hiring

Yesterday's AI for Education's webinar, "Building Student AI Literacy," highlighted the critical importance of preparing students for a world increasingly shaped by AI. And for those participating in Common Sense's Digital Citizenship Week, our approach aligns with the goal of promoting a healthy, balanced, and positive approach to media and tech use among young people. Here are some of the key highlights of my discussion with Corey Layne Crouch: The Need for AI Literacy Research indicates that more than half of high school students are already using GenAI tools and that students as young as 7 are interacting with GenAI in applications like Snapchat and Roblox with no guidance or training. Building AI literacy is imperative for their safety and future success. Moving beyond the "AI is for cheating" narrative: We need to reframe the conversation about AI use in education to focus on safe, ethical, and effective (SEE) use rather than just academic integrity concerns. How to "SEE" AI Literacy Our framework for AI Literacy is that users will know how to use GenAI: Safely: Understanding data privacy, security, and responsible use Effectively: Learning how to prompt (when age appropriate), how to evaluate outputs, and know when (and when not) to use AI tools Ethically: Understanding the broader ethical implications of AI like bias, deepfakes, misinformation, academic dishonesty, cognitive offload, climate impact, and ownership/originality Age-appropriate approaches: We emphasized the importance of modeling AI use for younger students and guided exploration for older students, always considering age restrictions on AI tools and getting permission from parents. As educators, we have a responsibility to integrate AI literacy into our curriculum, ensuring students are prepared for the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. We'd love to know how you are incorporating AI literacy in your classroom or organization? Link in the comments to check out the full recording and all resources! #StudentAILiteracy #DigitalCitizenship #AIinEducation #GenAI

Over the past month we’ve added 15 new prompts to our Prompt Library for Educators – and it now has 138 prompts designed specifically for educators and leaders. Our prompts span a range of categories, from administrative to lesson planning, special needs to social/emotional learning. Our newest batch of prompts cover: 1.   Differentiating Instruction 2.   Administrative Operations, Hiring, and Fundraising 3.   Data Analysis 4.   Global Education and Citizenship 5.   Critical Analysis of AI Outputs As always, all of our prompts - Work with any GenAI Chatbot (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc) - Are customizable to adapt to your unique needs, subject, or grade level - Include exemplar prompts to help you get started quickly - Have additional ideas for getting creative and making the prompt work for you - Are always free!   Thanks to Lottie Dowling for working with us on the Global Education prompts. If you have a great prompt you want featured in our library, let us know! Check out the link to the prompt library in the comments. AI for Education #ailiteracy #genAI #promptlibrary #prompting

As AI continues to dominate the news for better or worse, there’s no denying its growing impact on our lives. The Nobel Prize agrees with two of the five prizes this year going to AI-related projects (the first time this has happened).   The Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to John J. Hopfield and Geoffrey E. Hinton for foundational discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning with artificial neural networks, paving the way for the current explosion of artificial intelligence. Something of interest to note, is there has been some controversy due to classifying this work under "Physics."   The Nobel Prize in Chemistry went to David Baker for computational protein design and to Demis Hassabis and John M. Jumper for protein structure prediction. The three used AI to crack the code of almost all known proteins and developed an AI model to predict their complex structures – work that had previously been considered almost impossible and a holy grail of chemistry.   Hinton is widely considered the “godfather of AI” (and now a massive AI doomer), and Hassabis’ cofounded Google Deepmind.   That these prestigious prizes have been awarded to pioneers in AI and machine learning underscores the profound impact of artificial intelligence on scientific advancement and society. But considering Hinton's extreme criticism of the same technology he was awarded for highlights the complex issues and ongoing debate about AI’s future implications and ethical considerations. You can check out the announcements on both prizes int he comments. AI for Education #AI #Nobel #GenAI

As AI reshapes the educational landscape, it's essential for educators to develop the skills necessary to prepare students for an AI-driven future. Join Corey Layne Crouch and I next Wednesday October 16th for our webinar "Building Student AI Literacy" where we'll introduce the key strategies and tools necessary to empower teachers to cultivate students' essential AI literacy skills. Key topics include: 1. AI Literacy Fundamentals: Understand the crucial role of AI literacy in preparing students for future careers, fostering critical thinking, and promoting responsible digital citizenship in an AI-saturated world. 2. How to SEE AI Literacy We will introduce our SEE framework for AI literacy: being able to safely, ethically, and effectively use AI. 3. Essential AI Skills for Students: We'll Dive deep into core competencies like understanding AI’s capabilities and limitations, identifying appropriate use cases for AI (and when it's best not to use AI), identifying how to stay safe when using these tools, and key ethical considerations. Come hang out with us next week as we discuss how to prepare students for the future of education and work, ensuring they can navigate, critically evaluate, and ethically engage with AI technologies in their academic, personal, and future professional lives. Can’t make the time? A recording + resources will be emailed to all registrants. Link in the comments to learn more or register! AI for Education #genAI #ailiteracy #aI #aieducation

One of our favorite free resources at AI for Education is our monthly newsletter for educators (we already have over 65k subscribers!). Today's edition covered:   • Google Notebook LM highlights and video review • The 5 key questions to ask stakeholders about AI to help inform your school or district’s adoption strategy • Claude’s upgrade and artifacts feature review, with video walkthrough and use cases for educators   • Why AI in schools isn’t just about cheating, and how academic integrity concerns are just the tip of the iceberg • Breaking down two studies on AI-assisted tutoring and how they impact learning   • The 3 key tasks to accomplish in the next three months to put your academic institution on the path to responsible AI adoption • Chicago public schools’ AI guidebook & highlights   • The top stories on AI in education from across the web   • Recent AI for Education webinars, new & updated resources, and highlights from our work on the ground If you are looking for a practical, practitioner focused AI newsletter, then we have you covered. You'll also be the first to hear about new webinars, free resources, product reviews, our next AI Summit, and more great events we have planned for the rest of the school year. Link in the comments to subscribe! AI for Education #aieducation #aiforeducation #GenAI #AI #Ailiteracy

Every organization should ask 5 simple questions about generative AI to uncover who's using it, which tools and use cases are most popular, and what fears and hopes people have about GenAI. Based on our work over the past year with nearly 150 educational organizations, we’ve developed a these questions to help inform school and district GenAI adoption strategy. To make these questions as easy as possible to ask and evaluate, we have created two google form surveys you can adapt for your audience – faculty/staff and students - and two new prompts for the analysis of the data. The 5 questions are-:   Q1: How often do you use GenAI - tools that can create new content such as text and images, like ChatGPT?   ·   For educators: Tailors training to meet teachers where they are based on responses; identifies early adopters who could mentor others ·   For students: Establishes students’ exposure to GenAI by grade level, background and gender; highlights AI literacy needs   Q2: Which GenAI tools have you used? (List tool options relevant to your context and allow for write-ins)   ·   For educators: Identifies popular tools for vetting and piloting, as well as screens for potential security issues ·   For students: Provides insight on student use; identifies GenAI tools to adopt and any support students need to use them responsibly   Q3: How do you use GenAI? (List options related to work, study, recreation, etc.)   ·   For educators: Reveals areas in which GenAI is already impacting teaching and identifies areas for further training ·   For students: Provides insight on student AI use beyond schoolwork (entertainment, creativity, and personal projects)   Q4: What most excites you about gAI?   ·   For educators: Identifies practices and opportunities that resonate with staff and drives enthusiasm for GenAI adoption ·   For students: Identifies student aspirations and areas of excitement that can be used to create engaging GenAI-enhanced learning   5: What most concerns you about GenAI?   ·   For educators: Proactively addresses potential roadblocks and resistance; mitigates risk and provide meaningful support to teachers ·   For students: Informs the development of AI literacy programs to address potential anxieties, misconceptions, and ethical considerations   We have already seen how impactful this data can be and hope these resources will help your organization get started collecting data this semester on GenAI. Links to the pdf, google forms, and prompts in the comments! AI for Education #aieducation #ailiteracy #GenAI #AI

A new study from Stanford released today suggests that AI-assisted tutoring, when designed to support rather than replace human tutors, can have a moderately positive impact on student learning outcomes. Study Overview: - Stanford researchers conducted a randomized controlled trial of about 1,000 students and 900 tutors to examine the effectiveness of an AI-powered digital tutoring assistant called Tutor CoPilot - Tutor CoPilot provides educator-curated, AI-driven suggestions on how to address student mistakes - Tutor CoPilot showed promise in improving students' short-term performance in math. The impact was particularly significant for students with less-skilled tutors, showing a 9% improvement in student achievement. - Tutors using the AI tool were more likely to ask helpful questions and less likely to give students direct answers. - The estimated cost to run the AI system is approximately $20 per tutor annually based on the two month study - Similar to other tutoring studies, this approach particularly benefited students who started with low- and mid-level achievement. When asked to review the study by the 74 (thanks Greg Toppo), I shared these thoughts: 1) Intelligent tutoring is the holy grail for tech and education with the Bloom's Two Sigma problem (even though the results have never been replicated). From Khanmigo to Sam Altman mentioning a tutor for everyone in his Intelligence Age post, it is a big push for EdTech companies. 2) Great to see a well created study on GenAI impact on students and tutors, and I would love to see more in the space. The focus on economically disadvantaged, minority students, and ELs was refreshing to see. 3) For the results, there really isn't anything too substantial/statistically significant except for the impact on the lowest rated tutors. This skill gap closing has been mirrored in other studies in industries like consulting (BCG papers), so a lot of signs pointing to this as a first major benefit of GenAI. The students in the treatment group did not improve their final assessment scores, so there was minimal impact from the 2 month study. 4) Most of the use of the chatbot support was during the "meat" of the tutoring, e.g., problem solving and explanations. Which is where there is the most benefit of a tool as the technology advances. 5) The key issues identified by the tutors were the lack of leveling to student grade/age, which should get better with models that can reason. 5) The design prioritized student privacy, which was great, but also limited the quality of the support to the tutor as the context was only the last 10 responses. Check out the full study, one pager, and the 74's review in the links! AI for Education #ailiteracy #GENAI #tutoring

Jumpstart AI adoption at your school or district with our 3x3 GenAI Adoption Challenge. Inspired by a successful Arizona initiative, we've distilled key insights from our 100+ educational partners to guide your institution's responsible integration of GenAI. By completing three key tasks in the next 3 months, your institution will be on its way to empowering faculty and students – and your whole school community - to build the knowledge and mindsets necessary for GenAI use. Ready to join the challenge? 1. Gather data and evidence from stakeholders (teachers, students, leaders, caregivers, and community members) by sending out a survey, hosting focus groups, and/or holding a town hall 2. Create a cross-functional AI working group to coordinate your efforts including a diverse range of stakeholders (not just leaders) 3. Develop a plan for responsible GenAI implementation that focuses on the development of AI literacy and guidance for responsible use To learn more, access free resources including surveys for students and teachers, and add your school or district to our interactive global map – check out the link in the comments! AI for Education #ailiteracy #genAI #teachingwithAI #ailiteracy